As promised, Apple just debuted its upcoming iPhone OS 3.0. Much of the news seemed developer-centric, but there are certainly plenty of consumer implications down the road, along with long-awaited functions like copy and paste, A2DP, MMS and universal Spotlight search. Improvements include:

Spotlight has been added to a new home screen page to the left of existing pages, allowing for universal search on the phone. (more here)

Tethering is built into 3.0, and Apple will work with carriers on that -- who will have the last say on its implementation, most likely.

App Store will be available in 77 countries.

Parental controls for TV shows, movies and App Store apps.

Auto-login for WiFi hotspots.

Apple apps

A new app called Voice Memos which lets you record notes and reminders.

A revised Stocks app, with news stories and a landscape view.

Landscape view available for Mail, Text and Notes.

CalDAV support has been added to Calendar, along with subscriptions support in the .ics format.

Apple's major apps have all been expanded with search functionality.

Note syncing to Mac and PC.

YouTube account support.

Form auto-fill.

Phishing protection.

Shake the shuffle iPod playback.

A developer beta of OS 3.0 is available today, and the 3.0 update will be coming to consumers this summer as a free update to all iPhone 3G customers. It'll also work for 1st gen iPhone owners, though they won't receive A2DP or MMS due to hardware limitations. iPod touch owners will be able to update for $9.95, just like last time.